Md Anwar Ullah, Dhaka: Bangladesh Hockey Federation (BHF) are working heart and soul to bring back the enthusiasm of hockey, as they have fixed schedules with the national and Under-21 national hockey teams eyeing to host two prestigious Asian tournaments and participate successfully therein.
The BHF began their activities after the Bangladesh Football Federation (BFF) and Bangladesh Cricket Board (BCB) started their activities with the respective national sides following an announcement from the Ministry for Youth and Sports to begin all sporting activities after a bit relaxation from coronavirus strain and lockdown.
Beside planning to host two international tournaments, the BHF are also going to organize meeting with the league committee to orchestrate the domestic competitions.
Initially, the BHF concentrated on hosting the international meets titled the Asian Champions Trophy and the Bangabandhu Under-21 Asian Championship, which were supposed to take place in 2020 as part of the celebration of ‘Mujib Borsho’.
As all the programmes of the ‘Mujib Borsho’ the birthday centenary of the Father of the Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman were postponed due to outbreak of the deadly Covid-19, the tournaments deferred to 2021.
Targeting the Asian Champions Trophy and the Bangabandhu Under-21 Asian Cup Championship to be organized in early 2021, the BHF already appointed head coaches and their deputies, managers and almost all the coaching staffs.
However, Mahbub Harun, who was appointed as the head coach of the national sides, told The Independent on Thursday about his impression and how he would prepare the national team.
Mahbub Harun, the former national star first of all expressed his deep concern about the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic.
“Yes, I have received the letter (appointment) and timing for the onset of the training camp is yet to be decided and as I know, all are under procedure and may be from early of next month. But the most valuable question of this time is coronavirus situations, actually I am very much worried, whether the condition turns worse or better to permit us doing all normally,” Harun scared.
“There are so many issues like maintaining social distance and other safety measures in order to organize the camp.”
“Anyway, the federation planned to start the camp ahead of the two tournaments, Bangabandhu Under-21 Asian and Asian Champions Trophy, both the competition were scheduled for 2020 but forced to defer to 2021 due to COVID-19 pandemic.”
Apart from the threat of the COVD-19 calamity, once the master performer Harun is also very much pensive about the players’ fitness – “Players are out of any action for the last seven to eight months and yet to play any international or domestic match since the Asian Games and Premier League Hockey in 2018 respectively.”
“In this situation fitness is the main concern but I think it’s recoverable as we have five months in hand to play matches. It will take one and half months to regain fitness and rest of the time will be utilized for training session.”
“One important issue to me is the venue of the players’ camp and training ground, as I know that most of the players are from the Bangladesh Army and Air Force teams and are now under their custody, Harun said.
“However, if we could start our action with the teams, hockey will get back the excitement, Harun highly expected. Source:The Independent
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